Neptune and its moons11/25/2023 ![]() ![]() No further moons were found until Voyager 2 flew by Neptune in 1989. This indicated the presence of a moon rather than a ring. While observing a star's close approach to Neptune, the star's luminosity dipped, but only for several seconds. If rings were in fact present, the star's luminosity would decrease slightly just before the planet's closest approach. The discovery of this moon was purely fortuitous, and occurred as a result of the ongoing search for rings similar to those discovered around Uranus four years earlier. The third moon, later named Larissa, was first observed by Harold J. Kuiper (for whom the Kuiper Belt is named) using photographic plates from the McDonald Observatory in Fort Davis, Texas. ![]() The first was Nereid, Neptune's second largest and most massive moon, which was discovered on May 1st, 1949, by Gerard P. It would be almost a century before any other moons would be discovered. It was observed by William Lassell on October 10th, 1846, just seventeen days after Neptune was discovered. Triton, being the largest and most massive of Neptune's moons, was the first to be discovered. Neptune now has 14 recognized satellites, and in honor of of their parent planet, all are named for minor water deities in Greek mythology. But by the mid-20th century and after, thanks to improvements in ground-based telescopes and the development of robotic space probes, many more moons would be discovered. Initially, only Triton – Neptune's largest moon – could be observed.
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